More Cherries

To find out what is happening this summer in the North Fork Valley of Colorado, please see my previous post.

So I have my six pints of Bings put up, and since one, the seventh, didn’t seal, I refrigerated it and tried a new recipe. It’s rather weird, but my houseguest Huger Foote and husband Kevin went wild over it, so here ‘tis: Ancho Pork with Bings. You can just squeeze out the pits since the flesh is soft from processing.

First, make the ancho sauce. It makes about 4 cups and holds well in the freezer for up to six months.

Drain the chiles and remove the stems and seedpods. The chiles may feel a little tough in places. As long as the flesh is not hard, it is okay. (If there are hard parts on the chile that’s probably because it floated above the surface of the water. Push the chile down into the water and hold it there with a cup or some other object until it is soft.)

Combine the chiles and the remaining ingredients in a blender in batches and blend to a fine puree. Do not add salt to foods you plan to freeze. (If you use the sauce right away, add salt to taste.)

Pour the chile sauce into a large saucepan and bring to a low boil over a medium heat. Allow the chile sauce to cook for about 10 minutes, so the flavors meld. Watch for chile spatter if the sauce boils too high.

Heat the oil in a large heavy bottomed pot over a medium high heat. Salt the ribs and add them to the oil. Brown the ribs for about 20 minutes, until they release easily from the bottom of the pot. Don’t worry if the pork smells rather porky. It won’t by the time you are finished cooking the dish.

Heat the chile sauce in a small saucepan over a medium heat. Add the chile sauce and the chicken stock. It should just cover the meat. Turn the heat down to medium low, cover and cook until the meat is tender, about 1 hour. Check periodically to make sure the liquid doesn’t reduce before the pork is done. If it looks dry, add a bit more stock. (This can happen at high altitudes.) Remove the cover and cook for another 30 minutes, until the sauce is reduced by about half. If the sauce separates, with mahogany colored oil around the periphery, don’t worry. It’s okay (actually, it’s delicious). Just stir it back in. Break up the meat with a fork and adjust the seasoning. Add the cherries and heat through, a few minutes.

We ate this dish two ways: in small bowls with warmed tortillas on the side, a squeeze of limejuice and a bit of cilantro to garnish, and in tortillas.

Sour Cherries
Makes 5 pints

My neighbor here in the North Fork Valley, Jackie Parks called and said the two little sour cherry trees in her yard were overflowing with fruit, and I should go and pick. I took my houseguest, the photographer Huger Foote and we collected two big bags of them.

The pitting took forever. My friend Marilee Gilman uses a chopstick to push the pit through (the flesh is soft), but I just squeezed them, getting juice all over my clothes. So note—wear an apron and stay away from surfaces that stain easily (like my white wall).

For years I canned sour cherries for my kids’ pediatrician in New York, Dr. Heiss, who adored them (the kids and the cherries). After he died from Child’s disease, I continued to give an annual pint or two of cherries to his wife. But after a few years I began to feel awkward about imposing myself and Dr. Heiss’ cherries on her, and so I stopped. But in the privacy of my own kitchen, I make a couple of pints every year, out of love for him.

There is an Eastern European tradition of eating sour cherries from a little spoon during teatime, a practice which sounds lovely, but I mainly use sour cherries for pie during the holidays. I also freeze a couple of four-cup bags of them, ready to dump in a sugary crust over the winter.

4 quarts pitted sour cherries
2 cups sugar

Place the cherries and sugar in a large heavy bottomed pot and heat over a medium-to-medium low heat until the sugar dissolves and begins to boil. Shake or gently stir the cherries to make sure all the sugar is dissolved.

Have ready 5 sterilized pint jars with new lids. (To sterilize, boil the jars for 10 minutes. Simmer the lids in a small pot of hot water to soften the rubberized flange.) Using a slotted spoon, fill the jars with cherries—its okay to press them down gently.

Cover the cherries with the syrup, leaving ½ inch headroom. Place on the lids, screw on the bands fingertip tight, and process in boiling water for 10 minutes (add 1 minute for every 1,000 feet above sea level). Remove the jars and allow them to come to room temperature, check the seals, and store in a cool, dark place.

Hi Eugenia,
I saved out a pint of Bings to try this delicious sounding recipe tonight. Can’t wait to taste it!

I have a question about my baby artichokes…they are seasoning nicely, they look very yummy, tender and tasty. I’m noticing that there is a slight separation at the top (presumably from the olive oil). It mixes in when shaken, but I’m wondering if this is normal? It’s my first time w/artichokes so I followed the instructions from Well Preserved to the T, and the seals are nice and strong. Is a little separation of the oil OK?
Thanks,
Jeanne D

Hi Eugenia,
I saved out a pint of Bings to try this delicious sounding recipe tonight. Can’t wait to taste it!

I have a question about my baby artichokes…they are seasoning nicely, they look very yummy, tender and tasty. I’m noticing that there is a slight separation at the top (presumably from the olive oil). It mixes in when shaken, but I’m wondering if this is normal? It’s my first time w/artichokes so I followed the instructions from Well Preserved to the T, and the seals are nice and strong. Is a little separation of the oil OK?
Thanks,
Jeanne D

I picked some sour cherries this June from a tree here in town. I found that the best way to pit them is to gather the cherries with the stem attached. If they are ripe, a combination of gently squeezing the cherry while pulling on the stem allows the stem and pit to be removed as a single unit. It works on about 80% of the fruit. Try it next year!

I picked some sour cherries this June from a tree here in town. I found that the best way to pit them is to gather the cherries with the stem attached. If they are ripe, a combination of gently squeezing the cherry while pulling on the stem allows the stem and pit to be removed as a single unit. It works on about 80% of the fruit. Try it next year!

Eugenia Bone, a veteran food writer who has published in many national magazines and newspapers, is also a cookbook author. She is the author of Well-Preserved (Clarkson Potter 2009). She has contributed to many cookbooks and a few literary journals, been nominated for a variety of food writing awards and participated in radio, interactive and online interviews, in addition to appearing multiple times on television. She lives in New York City and Crawford, Colo.

The secret to tasty food is homemade and seasonal. To do that, you've got to put up food. Well-Preserved reports on small batch preservation year round, and generates recipes from those preserved foods.